(The Disneycember logo is shown, before showing clips from Elemental)
Doug (vo): It's the little movie that could, but couldn't. But then...kinda could? Elemental started off as a huge box office bomb, but then overtime, started to get a little bit of a...I don't want to say following, but audience. It did overtime find its audience, and, while not massive, was definitely better than how it started out. And I think like many of you, I had the same reaction. I saw the teaser and said, "Oh, that could actually be really interesting". We've seen toys and emotions and even souls have souls, so how do you go even deeper than that? Try the elements. Yeah, okay, I can see how this can work. But then, once the trailer came out, it was very clear what it was. It was Zootopia with dad jokes. The message is basically Zootopia, the city is basically Zootopia, the humor is basically Zootopia. It's just, Pixar, I guess, hasn't done it yet, so they're giving it a try. So like many of you, I didn't have much interest in checking this movie out. Not because I thought it'd be terrible, but because it'd be boring, standard, generic. And now that I've finally watched it...yeah, it's-it's all of that. But as a lot of other people pointed out, it's hard to say it's really...bad. I just can't really say it's...good or entertaining. But...doesn't that kind of automatically equal bad? I-it's a little complicated, let me explain.
Story[]
Doug (vo): A fire family leaves Fireland...yeah, isn't that an incredibly imaginative name? Anyway...trying to create a new living. They give birth to a child named Ember, and as you'd imagine, there's a lot of tricky scenarios in which fire people don't always mix with water people or wind people or Earth people. But overtime, they eventually fit in, and Ember is even being built up to be the future owner of her father's store. One day, the temper of the job gets to her, and she literally blows her top, causing a leak in the pipes, which introduces her to a water guy named Wade. His thing is, he cries a lot. It's annoying and not very funny. Wade, it turns out, is an inspector, though, and he has to turn in a report that lists all the big problems in the store, which will eventually get it shut down. Ember tries to find a way to save the shop, and Wade, feeling really bad for her, tries to help her out, even though he's kind of the reason this is all happening to begin with. As you'd imagine, a romance forms between them, and, yeah, you can pretty much imagine everything else, too. Exactly what you think is going to happen to this movie pretty much happens. Ember doesn't want to take over the store, her father doesn't know this, she keeps a secret that the shop is going to close down and that it's her fault it's going to close down. The family doesn't like the water guy because elements don't mix...yeah, did you catch on to that yet? This results in a classic "liar revealed" story, and you know how I feel about those, which also results in a third act breakup in which everybody has to sulk and feel bad and nothing funny is happening. And again, the movie's acting like it's the first one to ever do this idea. By God, I hate this trope!
Review[]
Doug (vo): But like I've said before, I can usually overlook this stuff if the characters or the comedy have a lot of wit and charm to them. And...okay, once in a while, there is a joke that works okay. I like at this big sports game, they actually do a literal wave. I like some of the names. I mean, actually, Lava Java, I think would be an amazing name for a coffee place. I guess I can't say they're annoying, per se. Well, okay, like I said, once in a while, Wade gets a little annoying, but I've seen far worse. They just don't leave that big an impact. But here's the thing. This film did find its audience overtime, and most of the people that saw it kind of said the same thing. It was fine, it's an okay film to take your kids to, get an okay message at, and I guess that's somewhat where I fall. There's still one or two things, though, that lean me towards the "I don't think it's objectively good" category.
(Footage focusing on the romance between Wade and Ember is shown)
Doug (vo): One is, I don't think there's any chemistry in the romance. I do not believe these two are in love. And once more, I've seen much worse romances in other films, but I just feel nothing when these two are together, despite the mother saying she can literally smell love. Sounds a little creepy when you think about it, but whatever. I'm not a fire person, I don't know what their special powers are. But I think the biggest problem for me, anyway, is that I'm constantly thinking what this film could be, because you do see the constant effort and, yes, at times, real creativity that goes into the making of this. But there's nothing really innovative about it.
(Footage focusing on Elemental City and its inhabitants is shown)
Doug (vo): Look at this city. This must have taken so much time to design and create and figure out how do all these elements kind of come together in this one place. But because we already have seen something like this in Zootopia, it doesn't feel very exciting. Why can't the water people live underwater? Why can't the fire people live in a volcano? Why can't the air people live in the clouds? The compromise they come to with this city is very boring, even though it looks like a lot of effort did go into designing it. Everything's almost on the right track, like the fire people live outside a volcano, but why is that interesting? Why is that fun? Put them inside the damn thing. I want to see how that would work. I don't know how that would work, but that's why these people are paid lots of money to think of stuff that I can't think of.
(Various footage is shown, mostly focusing on Wade and Ember)
Doug (vo): I see what they're trying to do with Wade, kind of make him the lovable, sensitive guy, but whether it's in the writing or the performance or a little bit of both, this character never seemed to find his voice. They say he's really good at connecting with people, but honestly, aside from one scene at that sports game, I never really saw it again. The most interesting stuff in the movie is probably with the fire people, and I don't even mean that in a sense of, like, the characters are that great. Again, I guess they're not bad, they're just characters we've seen before. But the way they have to move around this city and be careful of what they touch and what they don't touch and what can hurt them, what can even kill them is honestly pretty creative. I was honestly connecting it to living with a disability. Like, there's certain things you can't do that other people can do, but there's a flip of that, too, like, there's certain things you can do that other people can't do. I also thought maybe they were going to do something with anxiety. Like, she literally blows her top whenever stress gets too much for her, but they don't really do too much with that. And honestly, the most interesting question is, how are these two going to interact with each other, like, physically touch each other? They kind of dance around the question, and I, too, was wondering, "Well, yeah, how are they going to do it?" And I do really like a lot of the compromises that they use in this. I think that's probably the strongest moment of the film is whenever they try to do something with that. There's one moment where her mother says Wade has to set something on fire, and he doesn't know how to do it, and without going into spoilers, the way he works with it is very, very clever. And when they do eventually touch, I like it's not 100% explained, it's kept a little vague. There's kind of different ways you could interpret it, in my opinion. Like, maybe they're touching very carefully, or maybe they're just suddenly creating a new element when they touch. I don't know, I like they kind of left that a little vague.
Final thought[]
Doug (vo): But as I mentioned before, it did find an audience overtime, and I can't act like I'm surprised when somebody sees it and says, "Yeah, that was okay". For me, there's just one too many things in it that just suck out the interest and give me kind of a boring flick. And as I've mentioned before, we do kind of raise the bar a little bit when it comes to Pixar. Their films are so well made and so timeless, we really do expect that quality. And if this was just trying to be a small, little story, you know, very laidback and not about anything that major, maybe I'd excuse it. But you can tell it's trying to do what a lot of stories with very direct symbolism nowadays, and I'll admit, a lot of them from Disney, are trying to do. Some of those stories can work, others like this one are pretty dull. But like I said, I can't think of anything incredibly annoying about it or godawful. Actually, I kind of like the fact there's no villain in this story. I think this would have been a very easy story to insert one in. If Zootopia is the In the Heat of the Night of Disney films, then I guess this is the Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? of Disney films. I didn't hate it, I wasn't frustrated, I just felt bad thinking about what it could have been. But again, I shouldn't always judge something for what it could have been, I should judge it on what it is. And for what it is, it's...very meh for me. Both Disney and Pixar have definitely made far worse in the past and even recently. (The poster for Lightyear is shown briefly) But it's nowhere near the level of Disney or Pixar's best, either. If you're looking for a movie to play for your kids that has an okay lesson and a couple good visuals in it, it's fine. But if you're looking for something as exciting, funny and imaginative as Pixar's best, then the spark just isn't there.
(The film's final scene, showing Ember about to depart Elemental City on a ship with Wade, is shown)